Microsoft’s top lawyer called “disturbing” a new report saying the U.S. government may be eavesdropping on the company’s Web traffic overseas.

Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel, was reacting to a story published Tuesday in the Washington Post, which said leaked government documents suggest Microsoft services may be part of National Security Agency efforts to monitor digital communications moving between U.S. technology companies’ overseas computer centers.

“If they are true these actions amount to hacking and seizure of private data and in our view are a breach of the protection guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution,” Smith said in the statement Tuesday.

The Post story also said Microsoft officials believe the NSA “may have broken into its global communications system.” Microsoft didn’t address that claim in the Post story.

After previous reports of NSA efforts to intercept data from Yahoo and Google data centers, the companies said they would bolster encryption, or technology to scramble their computerized information to protect it from being easily read if intercepted.

Microsoft officials previously also said the company was considering additional steps to protect customer data. The Post story said Microsoft executives are meeting this week to decide on encryption initiatives.

The Journal previously has reported the government is able to intercept customer information from U.S. Internet companies by accessing telecommunications pipes that moves Web traffic it moves between company data centers outside the U.S. Because the email messages and other digital communications are often unencrypted, they are easy for the NSA to read.